The invention relates to a dispenser for medical preparations and an insert therefor.
Over the past 10-15 years, dispensers for medical preparations consisting of a box which releasably accommodates an insert with a number of compartments, have found extended employment. The compartments contain medical preparations, "pills", and are arranged in a specific manner, e.g. in columns and rows, so that the patient or the nurse can easily find one or more medical preparations that the patient is to take at a predetermined point of time. The box may, for example, have markings indicating the day of the week and the hour, and can be opened completely or partially to permit access to the preparations in the desired compartments. The box can be opened by means of shutters arranged in the top of the box. Examples of such dispensers are described in EP-250 636, U.S. Pat. No. 4,038,937, U.S. Pat. No. 4,062,445 and FR-2,575,730.
The general trend in this field goes towards scrapping the insert once it has been emptied of its contents and removed from the box. Then, a new insert with medical preparations, prepared e.g. at a chemist's or a hospital, is inserted in the box.
W092/02202 describes a dispenser where the insert is delivered with a sheet fixed to it and covering the compartments therein. The sheet may be perforated, and the perforation should, with the insert placed in the box and a shutter opened, be broken to permit access to the preparation/preparations in the desired compartments. The sheet may alternatively be peeled off and folded back before the insert is inserted in its box.
The problem encountered in the first-mentioned embodiment is that the sheet portion forming a cover on its compartment will prevent or complicate the removal of the preparation/preparations from the compartments after the perforation has been broken by puncturing the sheet portion. The problem encountered in the second embodiment is that when the sheet is peeled off from the insert, the forces associated therewith may easily cause the insert to tremble, making the preparations leave their compartments so as to either drop to the floor or jump into a wrong compartment. This is especially the case with older people who often have shaky hands. The trembling effect is often aggravated by the insert often being of a thin, flexible plastics material.
The object of the invention is to find a solution to this problem.
This object is achieved by a dispenser and an insert according to the claims.